Rama Ramanuja Achari, head of the Australian Council of Hindu clergy, recently wrote a blog supporting same-sex unions. His argument: Same-sex attraction is not a personal choice like "Should I have dal makhani or dal fry?"— It is an orientation with which one is born. In the Western context one is said to be "genetically predisposed towards same-sex attraction"; in a Hindu context it is a samskara inherited from one's previous birth, said the Sydney-based priest. Clearly, Hindu religion in foreign climes is adapting to changing times, even as India itself appears to be frozen in 1860, clinging to the archaic section 377 of Indian Penal Code that rules sex between homosexuals illegal and against the order of nature.

Members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community in this city expressed support to the passage of the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity and Expression (Sogie) Bill, which is...